Leveson inquiry - The 1%: "definitely in this together"

Ben Norman

As the prime minister faced questioning at the Leveson inquiry, lead counsel Robert Jay QC read out a text message that David Cameron had received from former News International chief executive Rebekah Brooks. The cosy relationship between Brooks and Cameron was laid bare - "We're definitely in this together".

Since the Con-Dems launched their austerity offensive their mantra, repeated from the dispatch box to the local council chamber has been, 'we are all in it together.' The slogan, supposed to evoke the mythical wartime unity of the blitz and shared sacrifice, has now revealed just how different the lives of Cameron and his class are from the rest of us in austerity Britain.

The text dates to the eve of Cameron's 2009 speech to the Tory party conference and a matter of weeks since the Sun newspaper had switched support from New Labour to the Tories.

"Yes we Cam"

Sickeningly Brooks refers to parties with Samantha Cameron and 'OEs' (Old Etonians) before claiming to look forward to joining the then leader of the opposition for a "country supper".

Brooks ended her text with "Yes We Cam", a wince-inducing parody of the Obama 2008 slogan which would become the Sun's headline following Cameron's speech. The Sun had chosen its editorial position on Cameron's speech before it was made, a practice the newspaper's editors have long denied.

Cameron's testimony also revealed that he had 1,404 meetings with 'media figures' while in opposition, and 13 a month since entering government. He then denied that there were any "overt" or "covert" arrangements between the press and politicians.

He can refute it all he likes but the inquiry has made clear what socialists explain. Capitalism is a system riven by class divide. The super-rich, who live in worlds insulated from austerity, act in their own interests. This includes using the big-business owned media as a battering ram against opposition to their anti-working class policies.

But now we can see that they are all, Cameron, Brooks, Jeremy Hunt, millionaire 'Minister for Murdoch', Labour's Tony Blair, Murdoch himself, as well as some of the police tops, in it together in a web of phone hacking, corruption and profiteering.

In that web alone is plenty of reason to bring down this hated government.